A line card and a fabric card are arranged inside a communications device. The line card in the communications device provides an interface for a user equipment and is a board used by the user equipment. The fabric card is a data exchange unit in the communications device. Different line cards exchange data using the fabric card. The fabric card is installed in a fabric card socket on a backplane using a fabric card connector, the line card is installed in a line card socket on the backplane using a line card connector, and the fabric card socket connects to the line card socket by means of wiring on the backplane, so that each fabric card connects to each line card and each line card connects to each fabric card.
Generally, the fabric card and the line card in the communications device mainly use an orthogonal connection architecture shown in FIG. 1 for connection. As shown in FIG. 1, multiple line cards 11 and multiple fabric cards 12 are separately installed in the communications device. Each line card 11 is installed in line card sockets (not shown in FIG. 1) on a backplane (not shown in FIG. 1) using line card connectors 15, and each fabric card 12 is installed in fabric card sockets (not shown in FIG. 1) on the backplane using fabric card connectors 16. The line card socket connected to each line card connector 15 and the fabric card socket connected to each fabric card connector 16 orthogonally connect to each other on the backplane, so that each line card 11 connects to every fabric card 12, and each fabric card 12 connects to every line card 11. A line card chip 13 is arranged on the line card 11. The line card chip 13 connects to all line card connectors 15 in the line card 11 and is used to exchange data between user equipments connected to the line card 11. A fabric card chip 14 is arranged on the fabric card 12. The fabric card chip 14 connects to all fabric card connectors 16 in the fabric card 12 and is used to exchange data between different line cards 11. Multiple fabric card sockets on the backplane that are used to install one fabric card are collectively referred to as one fabric card slot. Multiple line card sockets that are used to install one line card are collectively referred to as one line card slot. Multiple fabric card connectors 16 in one fabric card slot separately connect to different line cards 11 and are collectively referred to as one fabric card connector group; a fabric card 12 exchanges data between different line cards 11 using the multiple fabric card connectors 16 in a same fabric card slot. Multiple line card connectors 15 in one line card slot separately connect to different fabric cards 12, and one line card 11 and different fabric cards 12 are connected using the multiple line card connectors 15 in a same line card slot.
In a conventional communications device, at least one fabric card chip is arranged on a fabric card, and each fabric card chip on one fabric card provides data exchange only for one fabric card connector group. However, because the fabric card chip is a high-performance chip, there is redundancy in a data exchange capability of the fabric card chip and this causes a waste of system resources.